SATA cards

[WildW]

Hi folks,

I'm looking to add an extra SATA port or two to an H61 motherboard (they only have 4) running Windows 7. I have a 4x PCIe slot so that's easy enough. . .does anyone have any recommendations on the various chipsets that come on these controller cards? (Or ones to avoid?)

I had a few cards like this, maybe ten years ago, from the likes of Highpoint, Promise, Silicon Image, and I remember having frequent issues with "Delayed write failed" errors, though that may have been as much Windows XP and the hardware of the time.

Is any old cheap card a reliable option these days? I have no need for super speed or RAID, just something to attach some extra storage and not worry about it.

 

[Soulkeeper]

I've tried a few of the cheaper marvell and asmedia based cards, performance differences are very minor.
My favorite one was the highpoint 640l with the marvell controller, because it was pcie 2x and supported hardware raid. 9230, avoid any older 1x pcie marvell cards (9128)

Tomshardware did a roundup of these various cards sometime back, unfortunately they used an onboard 9230 which was only running at 1x
performance differences were mixed when compared to asmedia

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I've tried a few of the cheaper marvell and asmedia based cards, performance differences are very minor.
My favorite one was the highpoint 640l with the marvell controller, because it was pcie 2x and supported hardware raid. 9230, avoid any older 1x pcie marvell cards (9128)

Tomshardware did a roundup of these various cards sometime back, unfortunately they used an onboard 9230 which was only running at 1x
performance differences were mixed when compared to asmedia

I needed an SATA-III controller for my server, and I've been reasonably satisfied with this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ..._SATA_controller_PCI-E-_-15-158-365-_-Product

It uses the 9230 Marvel controller. It's an x2 card. While it offers RAID0, 1 and 10, it configures perfectly with the MS MSAHCI driver for AHCI mode, and doesn't require any BIOS tweaks to work immediately that way. I don't have any problems with it.

 

[Soulkeeper]

that's essentially the same as the highpoint one I got, that heatsink on yours is nice
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816115114

syba makes a cheap version as well, but they seem to get more complaints for whatever reason

 

[BonzaiDuck]

that's essentially the same as the highpoint one I got, that heatsink on yours is nice
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816115114

syba makes a cheap version as well, but they seem to get more complaints for whatever reason

In my situation, the server was built on an underutilized and quite ancient 680i board with nFarce controller. I didn't want to "do" RAID; I wanted a pool of AHCI disks, and there were problems with using the n-Farce.

So I actually dropped two of those Startech controllers in the box. I just wish the bandwidth of the PCIE v.1.0 was higher, but it's good enough for now. The advantage of it: I should be able to simply move the controllers to a new motherboard without fretting over the drivers.

The cards also come with the Marvel Hyper-Duo feature. And they're port-multiplier-ready, in the event you want to run one SATA cable to an eSATA backplate, and hook up a DAS with port-multiplier.

Somebody mentioned an IBM 8-port controller that can be had for less than two of these, and that might have been the better option. But it all works tip-top for me.